


I That Know Today, for I am Here Tomorrow

by Fox_the_Reaper



Category: Naruto
Genre: Angst, Complete, Drama, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-18
Updated: 2013-05-18
Packaged: 2017-12-12 06:03:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,724
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/808136
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fox_the_Reaper/pseuds/Fox_the_Reaper
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Minato understands things that no one else does.  It's not a matter of looking deeper or seeing underneath.  He simply knows.  A life in 25 moments</p>
            </blockquote>





	I That Know Today, for I am Here Tomorrow

**Author's Note:**

> This was a story I had posted on fanfiction, that got taken down for being a list, of all things. Considering I've seen people post those 1-50 one sentence a piece stories, and stories with chapters each as long as the segments in my story here, that are ALL still on that site, that pisses me off quite a bit.
> 
> Anyway, I had quite a bit of fun writing this, though it was a while ago (before much information was released about the Juubi and Madara, not that it matters for this story). I hope you enjoy!

1\. Minato understands things that no one else does. It’s not a matter of looking deeper or seeing underneath. He simply _knows_ , and follows that knowledge. Every piece and every player, and every step they make.

2\. As young as two, he watches the sunset over the ocean and seems sad. When his mother asks him why, he simply laughs and says, “Tired. Bed?” She’ll bring him inside but she’ll never know.

3\. When he is four, he blinks blue eyes up at his mother and says, “I do not belong here,” as seriously as a child is able to.

She looks down at him in confusion and replies, “Of course you do, honey. Why don’t you think so?”

He stares at her in frustration, wants her to understand the simple truth of his statement. When he realizes she never will, he leaves and doesn’t look back.

4\. Minato walks to Konoha, dusty and dirty, tired and thirsty, but unwavering. He never knew where he was going – only that he’d get there. So when a chuunin guard asks him bemusedly if he is lost, he simply smiles and says, “No. I’m home.”

5\. At six Minato enrolls in the Academy. The recruiter shakes his head as he watches the boy walk out of his office, and later comments that he’d turned up on his own and said he _needed_ to become a shinobi. At his colleagues’ bored gazes he shrugs and adds, “He looked like he knew what he was doing, but I swear I’d never seen him before.” It’s odd, he thinks, because he’s never forgotten a face he’s recruited. And the little blond boy was nothing if not memorable.

6\. A little red-head shows up at the school when Minato does. She yells she wants to be Hokage, and when it’s his turn he states his own future. The position is his and never hers; his future is set in stone. He knows this, and refuses to meet her almost hostile gaze.

7\. One day he apologizes to Kushina, for all that is and especially what will be, but she just casts him a strange look and loudly declares that he’s a flake and could he kindly get out of her face? He tilts his head and tells her she doesn’t understand, but someday she will. When she looks like she might hit him, he beats a hasty retreat.

8\. Minato studies hard, feels he already knows these things that he has to learn. At the same time, there’s knowledge he needs to find. He’s constantly nicking books from the student’s library, wishing for a Hokage’s unlimited access to books. But that’s too long to wait, and by the time he’s graduated at the tender age of 10, his teachers are impressed with his breadth of knowledge, but he hasn’t found what he’s been searching for.

9\. His team is going to be special, vows Jiraiya as he introduces himself to his new students. Two of them seem impressed, but the little blond does not. Arrogance, maybe, he thinks, because the kid is supposedly a genius and should know who he is if nothing else. But when the kid stands and states his name, followed by a soft, “It’s an honor to finally meet you, Jiraiya-sensei,” he begins to think, maybe not.

10\. Minato is almost uncommunicative in the way he never complains. It’s only long after his teammates are thoroughly fed up with D-rank missions that he speaks up in a surprisingly firm voice. “It’s time to get started on C-rank missions now.” Almost as an afterthought he adds, “Right, Jiraiya-sensei?” 

11\. The Chuunin Exams come and go, C and B-rank missions fly by. Jiraiya can’t figure out why nothing that happens, nothing he does or teaches or randomly exclaims, will ever faze his blond student. When asked, Minato studies him for a moment, smiles, and says, “Because I _understand_.” He never explains exactly what he understands though, and Jiraiya doesn’t ask again.

12\. When Kushina goes missing, it’s Minato that finds her. No one understands how, because he spent the entire time he searched staring at the ground. “How else would I have found her hair?” he asks, and no one has an answer.

13\. It is some time later that Kushina approaches, telling him rather than asking that he’d like to learn sealing. He smiles and nods and is completely unsurprised… right up until he realizes that part of what he was looking for was with her all along. Unused to the feeling, he shoves it aside and once more throws himself into learning what he knows will be his signature.

14\. Jiraiya watches as Minato grows further away. Oh he’s still with the team at all the times he needs to be, but never otherwise and he wants to know what his student is up to. He follows him one day, and suddenly realizes how fast the brat is as he watches him train. “Shouldn’t you practice your ninjutsu more?” he asks. “You don’t know that many.”

Minato doesn’t tell him that he won’t need to; that he will be more powerful with seals and brushes and a thrown kunai than he ever will with a basic fire jutsu. His affinity is wind anyway. But instead he replies, “No. I need to be faster. I need to know _how_ to be faster.”

Jiraiya watches skeptically, but leaves his student to it.

15\. Kushina’s unusually quiet, and for once Minato finds himself not knowing. He almost smiles at the thought. She’s the only one who can surprise him. And so his grin nearly splits his face when she asks, “Do you believe in fate?” She twirls her red hair in an almost nervous gesture.

Minato is absurdly pleased at how off guard he was at the question, but his reply is still a prompt, “Of course.” But then, he’s never really believed in anything else.

16\. Minato receives a student less than a year after he is promoted to jonin. He can’t help but watch the white haired child sadly, and for the first time, he wishes he is wrong.

17\. Kushina asks him out on a date, and Minato very nearly says no. He likes her, could almost believe he loves her, but he doesn’t want the future any longer, not the things he’d once seen through childish eyes, the things he knows now on a deeper level. But a quiet, instinctual urge won’t let him refuse, and his smile is very fake when he tells her, “Yes, I’d love to.”

18\. After Minato confronts the Hachibi Jinchuriki, he knows that it’s time. On several S-rank missions, he watches more than one tailed beast, and learns. As a swirling ball of brilliant chakra almost forms in his hands, he can even almost appreciate his knowledge again. Because the Rasengan isn’t of death; it’s for his son.

19\. Minato and Kushina go out to watch the sunset sometimes, and Minato always stares with sadness coloring his eyes. When Kushina asks why, he is silent for a long time. Finally, slowly, he answers, “Fire.” Hesitantly, he continues, “When… we go… it will be because of a monstrous flame, and the keeper in its shadow.” It’s an odd statement from him, whose favorite saying is “The fire’s shadow illuminates the village,” so she teases, “Fire doesn’t _have_ shadows, it _makes_ them.” She finds out quickly that he was being serious as his eyes darken to a navy hue. “Yes,” he agrees. “It does.”

20\. “Obito is dead,” he tells Kushina flatly, almost angrily, and there is something of hate in his voice. He continues, “I prayed it wouldn’t happen. I tried to stop it from happening.”

“We all do, when someone we love is in danger,” she gently replies.

He glances at her and sighs and seems almost resigned, defeated even. “This was different.”

She almost tells him that believing that is normal, too, but for some reason his eyes tell her it _is_ different. He stalks out before she can ask, though, and she realizes it’s probably not a good time.

21\. Jiraiya takes him to his home one day and tells him of the prophecy child, tells him that he thinks it’s Minato. Minato knows he is wrong. I’m not it, he thinks, but doesn’t say it to Jiraiya. Nor will he tell him that the sannin really will teach their savior. Those secrets are kept for his son.

22\. The day Minato is sworn in as Yondaime is the day he proposes. Ruby flowers in his hand, gold ring in his pocket, both colored in the flames that define his life, death, and the woman he loves. But he can no longer look at her without seeing her brilliant face on the altar of Madara’s sacrifice, can no longer think of himself without seeing the same for him. And for the first time, he is afraid.

23\. The day Kushina tells him that she’s pregnant, Minato smiles for her; for the few people who will know. When he finally gets some privacy, he cries for himself. For Kushina and his son. The countdown has started, and there’s no turning back.

24\. Minato gazes down at his son, who would only know them for less than an hour after his birth. His wife trying to make up for it; teach him all she can in those final moments. But he’ll see them again, when the nine tails breaks free and when he needs to learn. He glances at Kushina and her eyes flick back as she bursts into tears, apologizing for taking up all their time. And he realizes, in that one quick look, that she finally understands. The knowledge that only those about to die can see; the knowledge Minato has used for his entire life. But it doesn’t, _cannot_ matter anymore. So he watches his son and says his last words.

25\. Minato understood things that no one else did. It wasn’t a matter of looking deeper or seeing underneath. He simply knew. Every piece and every player, but helpless to change the game. Once he hated it, the inevitability that cursed his very existence. But when he knows the blond, whiskered face beaming from under the brim of a red hat, he smiles and thinks, _Thank-you._


End file.
